[MUSIC PLAYING] Say what you want about
nature versus nurture, but the conquer-the-world,
get-'er-done girl, type A part of my
personality was born into me. My name is Jodi Orgill Brown. I grew up in the wooded hills
outside of Washington, DC, in northern Virginia. By the time I was
four years old, I was already social,
outgoing, and even comfortable in front of a crowd. I even spoke at my
preschool graduation. In first grade, my teacher
would leave the room and leave me in
charge at the head of the class, which is exactly
the way that I liked it. A few years later, I ran
for student body president and lost but later ran
again for secretary. And that time I won. In high school, I was
voted most likely to become president of the United States. My parents had always told me I
could be whatever I wanted to. All it took was to
believe in myself, work hard, and trust
and have faith in God. In college, I
decided to try and do the four-year program in
just three years, and I did. But I was surprised to find
my husband along the way because that had not been
part of my plan--at least not at that point in time. And as much as Tolan and
I are opposites in what seems like nearly every way,
he is also my perfect match. We are so well
suited and stubborn. But we love each other and have
made a wonderful life together. When our oldest son
was born, I started working my nonprofit
job from home so I could love
on my little ones and still have a job that
would be a mental outlet for me and that would give me a
little control over something in my life. By the time our
fourth child was born, I was honestly
living what I would deem to be my
white-picket-fence life. Everything was the way I
had envisioned from the time that I was a little girl. But then the dizzy
spells started. And I had a hard time placing
one foot in front of the other as I walked down the hall. Within a few short months,
headaches ruled my life. And at Christmas, I couldn't
even sit and wrap presents without taking a break
to lay down on the floor to try and calm the
nausea and hope the world would stop spinning around me. I went to the doctor over
and over and over again. And by the time I finally
laid in an MRI machine, we were so desperate
for answers, I didn't think
anything could faze me. When the radiology
tech came and told me that there was a
mass on my brain, my immediate reaction was,
well, that makes perfect sense. I knew that something was wrong. Now they can fix it. And I can get back
to my normal life. Little could I have
imagined at that time what this journey would
do to me and how it could take all of the
strength from inside of me. But then a few weeks later, as
I sat in a neurosurgeon's office and looked eye to eye with
the physician, he looked at me and said, in the brain, it's
all about location, location, location. And I'm sorry to say that
Mrs. Brown, your tumor is in a very bad location. It seemed the
whole world started to crumble from around me. Everything I knew seemed
to fall out of my control. A few weeks later, I woke up
from my first brain surgery. And it seemed that my life
had been excavated along with the tumor. They had been able to
remove most of the tumor, but it left me with
my face paralyzed. My head was shaven and
covered in staples. Drool was dripping from my lip. My eye was big and wide
open and unable to blink. I couldn't even smile or
hold food in my mouth. And I had spinal fluid
leaking from my nose and down the back of my throat. It didn't take long for me to
realize that not all people are valued in the same way. A young man entered
my hospital room and was there to
clean and tidy up. But he looked at me and
stopped when he saw me. And he gave me an "I
feel sorry for you" look. Immediately, a phrase
from the New Testament flashed into my mind where
Christ says, "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the
least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me." The least of these? That was for the maimed
and the blind, the cast out and the sick. When had I become one
of the least of these? Not me. Not Jodi, the conquer-the-world,
get-'er-done girl. I couldn't be one of
the least of these. When did people stop
seeing me and start seeing a body in a bed? My life was totally changed. I could no longer care
for myself, my husband, or my small children. It seemed everything in my
life was out of my control. That is when I learned
that every interaction is an opportunity to change a life. And indeed, at that
time, every interaction did change my life
in one of two ways. Either it bolstered
me and helped me find strength to
keep fighting the battle or left me feeling
hopeless, helpless, and sometimes invisible. One day, a CNA entered my room. She did not tell me her
name, only announced that she was there to bathe me. She helped me get onto
a plastic mattress and wheeled me down the
hall to a shower room. She shut the door
in the shower room and proceeded to yank
the gown from my body and drop them on the floor. Then she grabbed the shower
hose and turned it on and started spraying me
down with cold water. I felt all of my
dignity and humanity spiraling down with the
tears and the water droplets. It seemed every part of me was
washing away with the water. I may as well have been a car
in a car wash, a body in a bed, a name on a chart. Every interaction is an
opportunity to change a life, and that interaction left
me defeated, deflated, hopeless, and wanting
to give up my fight. But nine long days later, when
I was still in the hospital and still fighting for my
life but finally starting to do a little bit
better, I had decided that that was going to be the
day that I was going to try once again to have a shower. I had made this decision and was
gearing myself up and getting all of my energy ready for this,
and then a young man walked into my room, walked
across the room, and wrote his name--Lucas--on
the whiteboard where it said "CNA on shift." Lucas. Great. The one day I decide I'm
going to take a shower, and I have a male CNA. I quickly decided
showers are overrated. My kids have proven that to
me on more than one occasion. If I could just
get my hair washed, I knew that that would give
me some of the strength and energy I needed to
get through another day in the hospital. So I asked Lucas, "Are Christie
or Heather or one of the girls around on shift today? Could they come in and
help me wash my hair?" And Lucas gave me a funny look. And he said, "I can help
you wash your hair." Right. OK. We'll go for that. So I told him I would love that. He said he would come
back a few minutes later. Sure enough, he showed
up 30 minutes later pulling a cart full of supplies. It reminded me more of
a circus than anything having to do with bathing,
but I trusted him. He came in and helped me scoot
down to the bottom of the bed, and then he draped black plastic
garbage bags all over the bed, up over the pillow, and
cascading down into a garbage bin at the bottom
so that the water would waterfall over the
bags and fall into the trash. Brilliant. He then scooted me back
up to the head of the bed and told to me to try and relax. I attempted to close
my eyes and then waited for what I thought would
be an awkward situation. But instead, he poured
pitchers of warm water over my not luxurious locks
but the little tiny sprouts of new hairs I had
growing back on my head. And he was very careful
as he massaged the shampoo into my scalp not to touch
any of my scars or my staples or do anything that would
compromise or cause me harm. He then proceeded to pour
another pitcher of water over my head and then
started the process again, this time with the conditioner. The process that could
have taken five minutes, Lucas spent 30 minutes
kindly, tenderly, gently massaging strength
and humanity back into me. His every action told me he
did not see me as maimed or as cast out or as sick. He saw me as a whole
person--but one who was hurting. By the time we finished, I felt
like I'd had a day in the spa. Lucas held little
status at the hospital, but he was a man who
acted with great stature. And that was far more important. His every action
emboldened me to continue the fight for my
life and to work hard to be able to
go home to my family. It even gave me the
silent acceptance to begin to love myself
and embrace my new life. And indeed, I would certainly
need that strength in the days to come. After three craniotomies and
multiple problems, surgeries, infections, shots,
lumbar drains, and all sorts of
side effects that kept me hospitalized
for more than 35 days, I was finally able to go home
and go back into the world. But I was not prepared for
how the world would see me. They didn't see me as a
survivor and as a conqueror. Many people saw me instead
as a comedic figure. They saw me and laughed. Every soul is great
in the sight of God. When Christ encouraged his
disciples to love and serve the least of these,
it was not an insult; it was an invitation,
an invitation to stop seeing
imperfection and start seeing the divine individuals
that we truly are. When we stop screaming
at each other and start seeing
each other, that is when we can embrace the
imperfections that we have and live our lives to
the fullest every day. No matter how dark
the storms of life, always remember, behind the
clouds, the sun still shines. There is a plan for you. Stand tall, look people
in the eyes, and smile. You are beautiful
and divine by design. Thank you.
